Georgia turns Four!

Singing 'Happy Birthday' to Georgia - she beamed the whole time!

I love being Georgia's mother!
We started the day with presents,
after which Georgia and I went out together to get our hair cut.

I have been a mother for four years now. Most of what I do as a parent comes naturally - the rest is a bit of trial and error. One thing is for sure - my first child is a dream (so is my second, but this post is about Georgia). It is fun and easy to be the mother of this pearl.

Today we gave Georgia some presents and a party to celebrate her fourth birthday. The party was a wonderful success. The girls played beautifully and the adults drank champagne and chatted happily. It was a lovely lovely day and the last guests left after 7 pm - the true signs of a great party! Thank you to Chris and Lori, for you lovely company and for helping to clean up! Thank you to my mum, for helping me in the morning, and for helping me ice the cakes. Your words of wisdom and encouragement are dear to me.

A serious moment as the cake is eaten

The family

Georgia and Matty opening presents in the morning - Matthew was most interested! He kept sayng "Ahhh" whenever Georgia opened something

Pretty cupcakes, thanks to mum, who helped! Very girly!

The butterfly cake. Again, thanks to mum who helped! And again, very girly. Could we have it any other way? Not with our Georgia (and me!)

The party girl

Four years ago, at 1:10pm, an 8lb baby girl was born. She was ruddy, had good lungs and was the prettiest, best behaved baby on the ward - and that's what the experts were saying! The parents were new at the whole thing; the father was ecstatic, his eyes gleaming, and the mother was tired yet in disbelief at her 3 hour labour! No drugs, no stitches - just a good long bath and three pushes (hah - makes it sound almost enjoyable!). And there was Georgia - squeaking and hiccupping through the night, her mother unable to sleep for fear of missing a precious moment of her new daughter's life.

And now here's Georgia. Auburn hair, blue eyes and porcelain skin. She is tall and slender and she loves dancing and singing. She loves abundantly and is generous with kisses and hugs. She smiles all the time - how happy we are to have such happy children!

Today I am celebrating my daughter. For when she came into my lie, I learned the things that are important, and she taught me to live and love.

First Day

Georgia, ready to go to kindy on her first day

Georgia had her first day of kindergarten today! She started pre-entry, and she was very excited. She started off by doing some puzzles. She is very good at puzzles, but she was telling me that she was feeling shy. She wanted her Simpsons figurine to keep her company. She warmed up when she saw her friend Grace, and got very excited when she saw the computer! When I left, she was playing a 'Finding Nemo' game with Anthony and Grace, and she didn't need her Simpsons toy anymore, so I put it in her bag as I left.

I got a report from the director as well. When I brought Georgia in, he told me hat she is "great, capable and confident." It certainly is to Georgia's advantage that she has been going to occasional care at the centre for 2 years now.

I'm so proud of her, being so grown up!

Another Tassie Trip

Georgia and me at Hartz National Park

Monte and Matthew at the lookout at Hartz Mountains, overlooking Wellington Gorge

Matty outside Big W in Kingston. The largest in the Sth Hemi. We were having a donut after picking up Amelia from school.

Amelia and Matty grew a special bond; they love eachother

Harry and Georgia also grew close in the time we stayed with the Smiths. She loved getting up to mischief with this gorgous, darling little boy

The Tulips at the tulip festival

Milly and Georgia, ready to hear a fairy story in the fairy cave

Milly and Georgia, looking for flower fairies after the fairy story. It was so much fun; they are so sweet!

SNOW on Hartz mountains. In October. There is SO much water, particularly in the south. The Hartz national park is a short drive from where we will be living soon.

My hunk of spunk cooking a BBQ lunch at the hut at the lookout at Hartz national park. There was an open fire and an excellent views.

Our most recent Tassie adventure was very busy and very productive. We bought a 23 acre block of land. It consists of good pastures and 5-6 acres of rainforest. There is power and water supplied but we will need to organise more. We have been in touch with the builder and we are planning our home before starting to build early in 2009. The land has a beautiful view. You can read more about it at www.gettingdowntoearth.blogspot.com

We stayed with ben and Jill again. The children played beautifully. we really feel like family, except better than that because we are also friends. The children play like friends/cousins/siblings, which means fun and the odd bickering. They were very busy and were always tired at the end of the day.

A highlight of the trip was going to the Tulip Festival at the Botanic Gardens. It was fun. There were lots of activities for the children. The flowers were so beautiful. I had fun taking the girls to the fairy cave, where they heard fairy stories and looked at fairy treasures. The girls got fairy wishes and fairy sparkles, and afterwards we looked for fairies in the tulips. I thought I saw one but it was a bee. The other girls didn't see any either.

The other highlight was visiting Hartz National Park, which is very close to where we'll be living. We saw snow on the mountains. Sometimes there was snow on Mt Wellington too, which is near Kingston, where we were staying. At Harts NP we went to a lookout after having a nice sausage sizzle. We saw Keogh Falls and looked over Wellington Gorge. It was a lovely family day.

We feel like we had a very productive time in tassie. Georgia is enrolled in a lovely little Catholic school, not far down the road. School in Tassie starts in Kinder, so she will have a uniform and all. The staff know I am a teacher and have suggested I come in to be their relief teacher! We've also done other important stuff, like open a local bank account and get a PO Box. We met the mayor and his Dep, and had a little chat about our plans. The town is a lovely place and the townsfolk are lovely. There are lots of tree-changers there, and they all say it was the best decision they ever made, to move there.

There is so much Water in Tassie. Flying over, you see many many dams, flowing rivers etc. It was quite wet when we there there. It is different being back here, where it 'rained' about 10 drops this morning.